Mr. Speaker, contaminated beef from XL Foods was first discovered by American inspectors on September 3. By September 6, the minister knew that XL was withholding E. coli testing data from Canadian inspectors. By September 13, the minister had determined that beef from XL was not safe enough to be sold to American families, yet the Minister of Agriculture withheld this information from Canadians. He let Canadians buy and eat contaminated meat.
Since the minister will not accept his responsibility and resign for this scandal, why will the Prime Minister simply not fire him?